I really thought I was onto something the other day. I imagined that I had stumbled upon an insight that could heal the divisions in our country and set us on a track toward the trust and understanding we will need to face the challenges of our time. It might, I dared to think, even save humanity.

Before setting out on my quest, however, I decided to look up the term “Libertarian Socialism.” That is the transcendently ironic name I had decided to give to my movement. I was certain that the conceptual tension between those two words would be the crowbar needed to pry people loose from their staid convictions and open the way to my rescue of planet Earth.

As I so often find when I google one of my bright ideas, however, someone else had it before I did. There is already something called Libertarian Socialism. What’s worse, its advocates actually believe it’s a workable governing philosophy. That, in my view, completely misses the point of Libertarian Socialism.

These people believe, among other things, that there shouldn’t be any state at all. Society under their flag would probably have no flag at all. The people would have all the power, and civil order would be kept by…well, I’m not certain how. I’m not necessarily pro-flag, but I have found that at least 25% of my fellow citizens are irredeemable boneheads. They are the reason we need a state, dudes. We just have to make it as fair and open as we can…and socialist, obviously.

That’s just one man’s opinion, of course. These people are also entitled to their opinions, and I’m right there with them in their distaste for authoritarians and unbridled capitalists. I guess my main complaint is that they stole the name of my movement — even though they thought of it first.

The beauty of my Libertarian Socialism is that the two words are mutually exclusive. The conceptual impossibility of this philosophical connection is the very source of LS’s power to unite. Think of it as a dynamic paradox. Libertarian Socialism, if its name had not been usurped by these misguided utopians, could have allowed the coexistence of our natural desire to help others with our equally natural desire not to be told what to do. More and more, I am convinced that the clash of these two motivations is at the root of all political discord. LS is not so much a philosophy of governance as a touchstone for meditation.

I don’t know, maybe it’s hopeless. Maybe I should just stick with Democratic Socialism and hope the right-wing populists finally wise up. Trouble is, that would require them to move toward me. They can’t be expected to like that any more than I would like moving toward them. Under Libertarian Socialism, we’d already be under the same tent — brothers and sisters living lives of paradoxical dynamism together.

So I am not going to give up on my mission. The door is still open to all you Anarcho-Syndicalists (my preferred name for the original LS’ers). Join me, and together we can rescue planet Earth from the corporatists, the fascists, and all the other control freaks who have been busting our chops for so long.